Dominic Monaghan Joins 'Star Wars: Episode IX'

The 41-year-old actor has joined the cast of Star Wars: Episode IX, ET confirms. The film reunites Monaghan with Lost creator and executive producer, J.J. Abrams, who co-wrote and is directingEpisode IX.

Monaghan revealed in 2014 that he had already had conversations with Abrams about joining the franchise, though at the time, Abrams was focusing on creating a cast of unknown actors for The Force Awakens, and Monaghan already had an established fan base for his roles in the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Lost.

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“Give me a lightsaber, I’ll do anything,” Monaghan told DweebCast at the time. "[Abrams] said, 'We’re putting together a cast of unknowns. We want to follow the ’77 New Hope cast because obviously, Harrison Ford wasn’t well known at that point, Mark Hamill wasn’t and Carrie Fisher wasn’t either.”

“What he said was, ‘We don’t want to fall into that mistake of people going, ‘Oh, it’s that guy from that thing!’ and then you’re completely out of the Star Wars universe,'” he explained.

Episode IX also marks Abrams' reunion with Felicity's Keri Russell, who Variety recently reported was in talks to join the beloved franchise. Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver, Oscar Isaac, Lupita Nyong'o, Kelly Marie Tran, Domhnall Gleeson, Joonas Suotamo and Billie Lourd are all returning for the film, alongside Hamill, Anthony Daniels and Billy Dee Williams. The late Fisher is set to appear as Leia through the use of unused footage from The Force Awakens.

ET has reached out to Walt Disney Studios for comment.

Star Wars: Episode IX hits theaters on Dec. 20, 2019. See more on the franchise in the video below.